Syria – the chess connection

7/8/2012 – "Parisian beauty outwits Assad", read the headlines. Manaf Tlass, the top Syrian general and personal friend of President Bashar Assad, had defected to Paris, dealing what many correspondents call a death blow to the murderous regime in Damascus. The desertion was planned by a "glamorous and fabulously rich Parisian society hostess." So why are we telling you all this?

Karjakin wins the Astana World Rapid Chess Championship

7/8/2012 – After two days of play and ten games Magnus Carlsen looked like the dead-cert winner. But then the Norwegian ace lost two in a row, allowing his "prodigy twin" Sergey Karjakin to catch and then overtake him. Serge won four in a row and in the last round required only a draw to win the title outright. He was a full point ahead of Carlsen, and two ahead of the third-placed Veselin Topalov. Exciting chess.

First day of the World Rapid Chess Championship in Astana

7/7/2012 – This event has sixteen players, ten of whom were seeded to the final, three won places in a qualifier, and two are wild cards from the host nation. After the first day the "twin prodigies" Sergey Karjakin and Magnus Carlsen are in the lead with 4.5/5 points and 3000+ performances. Rounds 6-15 will be played this weekend, followed by a Blitz Championship on Monday and Tuesday. Illustrated report.

Chess Problems: Obstruction and Paralysis

7/7/2012 – In his last column problem expert David Friedgood explained a special theme: obstruction. This occurs when a piece moves to a square so that another piece is prevented from occupying it. Today it is about paralysis, where not just one square is blocked, but all the squares available to a piece. The author explains the concept with two examples and gives us three problems to solve.

Anatoly Karpov on the Tour de France

7/7/2012 – The 2012 Tour de France is underway, and it is connected to chess in more than one way. The first is a giant online match between Anatoly Karpov and the Rest of the World, which is being hosted at the Europe Echecs website. Each day an article linking the race's events and the move chosen will appear. Also, a famous chess patron invested in one of the teams. Read to find out who.

Summertime Training – the Classical Dutch

7/7/2012 – 'Yes, it is that time of year when many of us are thinking of outdoor activities, but with chess being so portable these days why not consider a trainer to take along with you?' writes Seven Dowd in Chess Cafe. He recommends Andrew Martin's The ABC of the Classical Dutch, which he give five out of six stars. 'When you reach the end of your journey there will be masters waiting to teach you!'

Astana World Rapid: Carlsen dominates

7/7/2012 – After a slow start – two draws – top seed Magnus Carlsen went to work winning the remaining games on day two of the World Rapid Chess Championships. He remains undefeated in ten games, and has conceded just three draws. It is not just the result, but the way he "keeps sculpturing masterpieces," as the tournament bulletin put it. We have a few examples for you to study and enjoy.

Who needs stalemate – let's abolish it!

7/6/2012 – Stalemate is one of the more difficult concepts in chess: the game ends not with the capture of the enemy king, but one move earlier, when he is in check and cannot move out of it. Even more baffling, says reader Matt Bishop, is when the king is not in check but would have to move to an attacked square on the next move. That is a draw. Matt pleads for a radical revision of the rules.

Double sacrifice

7/6/2012 – Here the first player chose 26.Rxf4 gxf4 27.Bxh7+ Kxh7 28.Qh3+ to gain access to the h-file with tempo for her queen. What do you predict now?

A) victory for White;
B) perpetual check;
C) advantage for Black.

ChessBase Magazine, larger diagram and solution.

Is chess not for everybody? – Feedback from our readers

7/5/2012 – Boris Gelfand said he thought that chess was not for everyone, Peter Zhdanov wrote a piece saying it was. Chess must be presented to the general public for what it is: a sport, an art and science. Many readers agree: "Let us make a Smörgåsbord and have everyone decide what is tasty for them," writes one, and another says we should emulate the mentalist Derren Brown.

World blitz and rapid chess championship in Astana

7/5/2012 – The Official World Blitz and Rapid Chess Championships are being held from July 1-11, 2012, in Astana, the capital city of Kazakhstan. Top ranked players of the current FIDE rating list (Carlsen, Radjabov, Karjakin, Morozevich, Ivanchuk, Grischuk, etc.) have been invited, with qualifiers yielding the rest. The finals are sixteen-player events with a total prize fund of US $400,000 and start on Friday.

Daniel King: What happens next? – #3

7/5/2012 – GM Daniel King has set up an interactive YouTube format for chess training, one that is resonating well with our readers. In this third installment Danny leads us to a key position in a game from the Icelandic Championship and then asks us to choose between two strategical continuations. Like the game itself both moves are annotated by the GM. It's a fun way to improve your playing strength.

Is chess not for everybody?

7/4/2012 – Recently Boris Gelfand said he thought that chess was not for everyone. "Chess is for people who want to make an intellectual effort, who have respect for the game, and we shouldn't make the game more simple so that more people would enjoy it,” said the world championship challenger. Do you think this is true? Peter Zhdanov, IT project manager and debate expert, begs to differ.

8th Russia-China match – A tradition to look forward to

7/4/2012 – Now in its eighth edition, the Russia-China team match has become a tradition of the highest order. While the Russians may have enjoyed a comfortable superiority in the past, today it is one of their greatest challenges. This mammoth match of fifteen rounds and 150 games just started, and includes star players in both teams. Here is a first report and a bit of history on this elite encounter.

Mikhail Tal: Triumph and Tragedy (Part II)

7/4/2012 – Twenty years ago one of the greatest and most popular champions of all time, Mikhail Tal, passed away. In a previous column Prof. Nagesh Havanur described how the Magician from Riga spent his final days. Today he describes the friendship and rivalry between Tal and another world-class player, GM Paul Keres. Two encounters between the two are presented as deeply annotated games.

Endgame Magic with GM Karsten Müller

7/3/2012 – Endgame knowledge is not easy to acquire and for this reason it is a valuable weapon in practical tournament play. In his Endgame Magic Show on Playchess, the well-known endgame expert GM Karsten Müller will assist you with a bunch of practical endgames. He shows how to handle the positions, which will help improve your results. An example and more information.

Nigel Short wins 7th Edmonton International

7/3/2012 – This ten-player round robin took place from June 27 to July 2nd at the Edmonton Chess Club in Alberta, Canada. It started with a shock: top seed Nigel Short lost his first game against Israeli GM GM Victor Mikhalevski, 200 points below him on the rating scale. However the British GM went on to win six games and draw two. Our report contains two challenge questions for our readers.

Business Insider: 24 executives who are exceptional at chess

7/2/2012 – Games like bridge, poker, and chess all use methods that can be incorporated into the way you view and make business decisions. Chess in particular requires strategic decision-making, concentration, tactics, and evaluation. The US business/entertainment news website Business Insider lists chess masters and amateurs who moved on to successful financial careers.

Deep Fritz 13: how to use the engine cloud

7/2/2012 – Our new flagship program is shipping, vigorously, and customers seem delighted with it. But do they know how the premium new feature works? How to use your portable notebook to access chess engines on powerful computers in remote locations? How to set up your own desktop computer or rent computing power from others? All this is explained in a series of instructional videos by Nick Murphy.

Agon appoints Pentagram to reposition chess

7/2/2012 – As we recently reported, American media entrepreneur Andrew Paulson has founded a venture to host the World Chess Championships – with a prize fund of 5.4 million Euros! He has now appointed a leading design agency, Pentagram (in London) to rebrand the championships, which will be broadcast live on iPads, smartphones and cable TV channels. Press release (revised).

FIDE July ratings – Carlsen at a record 2837

7/1/2012 – "The gap is narrowing," we wrote in May, when Armenian GM Levon Aronian was just ten points behind the Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen. The difference has now grown to a whopping 21 points, with Magnus setting his sights on the all-time 2851 record set by Garry Kasparov. FIDE has announced that it will in future publish its ratings on a monthly basis and include Rapid and Blitz.

CBM training: Caruana's king, activating the rook, pushing passed pawns

7/1/2012 – These are the subjects of this weekend's series of lessons that our endgame expert Dr Karsten Müller has pulled out for you from the 7th Tal Memorial and the 65th Russian Higher League Championships. This is extremely valuable material that will increase your practical strength. ChessBase Magazine has many more of them, but the selection on our newspage is free. Learn and enjoy.

IV International Chess Festival Eforie Nord

7/1/2012 – The IV Chess Festival of Eforie Nord took place and enjoyed the participation of players such as GM Sergey Tiviakov, GM Viorel Iordachescu, GM Bela Badea, and WGM Adriana Nikolova. Sadly, due to an outright interdiction by the Romanian Federation and clubs, only eleven players showed up. Not giving up, the organizer formed a round-robin and still honored his prizes! Illustrated report.

Daniel King: What happens next #2?

6/30/2012 – ChessBase and British GM Danny King's interactive YouTube format for chess training is resonating well with our readers ("Marvellous!! Thank you so much for such a wonderful idea. I thoroughly enjoyed episode #1."). Here is a second annotated game in which you are led to a key position and then asked to choose one of two strategical continuations. Have fun.